1. Field of the Invention
The invention relates generally to operation of a matching service. Specifically, the invention relates to identifying and providing communication between people who are likely to have a successful relationship.
2. Background of the Invention
A matching service attempts to identify and bring together two or more people that the matching service believes may have a successful relationship. Many matching services identify matches by techniques that find people with common personalities, interests and/or beliefs. However, these matching techniques often do not account for the large number of variables that can determine whether a relationship is successful. Research has shown that the success of human relationships depends on complex interactions between a large number of variables including, but not limited to, personality, socioeconomic status, religion, appearance, ethnic background, energy level, education, interests and appearance. The large number of variables involved in determining relationship success has made predicting the success of a relationship to be very unreliable. Accordingly, matching services are unable to reliably predict relationship success and their clients are often disappointed with the results of their matches. As a result, there is a need for a method of matching people that accounts for the complexity of the relationships between the variables that determine relationship success.
After identifying candidates for a match, many matching services allow the candidates to communicate by telephone or by e-mail. Many people are not comfortable communicating with a new person in such an immediately open format. As a result, many people would be comfortable with a more gradual and less personal introduction to new people. Accordingly, there is a need for providing communication between matched candidates that is comfortable to the candidates.